"Metromarxism" discusses Marxism's relationship with the city from the 1850s to the present by way of biographical chapters on figures from the Marxist tradition, including Marx, Walter Benjamin, Guy Debord, and David Harvey. Each chapter combines interesting biographical anecdotes with an accessible analysis of each individual's contribution to an always-transforming Marxist theory of the city. He suggests that the interplay between the city as center of economic and social life and its potential for progressive change generated a major corpus of work. That work has been key in advancing progressive political and social transformations.
Biography
Andy Merrifield is Professor of Geography at Clark University. He received his Ph.D. from Oxford and is the coeditor of The Urbanization of Justice in addition to being a contributor to The Nation and Dissent.
"People who equate Marxism with drabness have not been keeping up with their shopping (Prada) or their reading. Merrifield, a British writer who now lives in New York, is accessible, optimistic and even fun. The urban center, Merrifield argues, is the site of economic extremes and for that reason the most promising field for social change. A primer for the postindustrial "children of Marx and Coca-Cola"." -- The New York Times
"The strengths of Metromarxism are immediately apparent. Merrifield is a lively, engaging , and sometimes humorous writer... He says enough about their ideas to pique our interest, concisely, and with the minimum of jargon. His judgements are consistenly sound, and the selected references useful... More taster than primer, this book nicely fills a niche." -- H-Net
